Fireflies recounts the writer's quest to find light to ease the darkness and suffering she encounters in the world as her beloved older brother is enveloped by mental illness. Her journey for answers takes her from small-town British Columbia to Zimbabwe and exposes her to spiritual and religious settings from 12-step programs to fundamentalism, from Anglicanism to African evangelicalism. She presents her experiences without judgment, and her story reflects where religion helps and where it fails to help find meaning in the midst of life's most painful challenges.